Growing up I did not want a sibling because of how I saw my friends who had a younger sibling. They just had to grow up so quickly, doing things like getting their younger siblings from day-care carrying them on their backs. I hated that and in the same breath felt sorry for them. They can only play outside for a certain time and then have to go bath their younger siblings. That meant play time was over for me too, so I have to go home and listen to adult conversations I wont lie and say that I was not a tape recorder, and a blabber month. So that was my hobby to observe and record, to tell and demonstrate later. Naughty child I was.
I loved the attention I got from everyone benefits of being the only child and just being the cutest socialite. Growing up things changed. I got tamed by my mother who was and still is very strict. Learned from what is wrong and right learned to think before I spoke, to be more respectful and mindful of the things I say and do. 17 years later now at 23, my behaviours have changed so drastically from being a loud and outspoken toddler, to being an attention seeking teenager to being a withdrawn young adult is a lot of change for this single child adult.
Being an only child I was constantly trying to figure out who I was from befriending the wrong friends to being happy being by myself, but that is still not enough. Being an only child means that I had to learn things by going through them. I needed to find myself so badly I could not tell my mother about it because I knew she had other things to do. I did not want to be a burden, she came home always tired or shouting about something I did not do; now that I think about it that is when I felt noticed when I was being shouted for something I did not do. I craved for so much attention that I felt noticed when I was being shouted at by my mother.
It is no doubt that being an only child even at 53 you will be treated like a child but expected to reason like an adult. My mother feels like she should hide certain things from me such as her health, thinking it will be too much for me to handle. But now I am a resilient only child young adult. I can practically handle anything that comes to me and I will most likely handle it on my own. Being an only child your are programmed to think a certain way. I do not know how explain it, but I will do my best. Being raised as an only child you are almost likely to be moldable to your environment and the people you choose or not choose to surround yourself with.
What I am trying to say is that being an only child is not easy, we get everything we want and need but along the way we get lost without guidance and attention then we learn and unlearn things about ourselves only to realise that this was not you in the first place you were influenced by your environment. I hope that someday I can find that little outspoken girl again I miss her alot. Advice to parents with a choice to have one child please give your child attention and guide them not change them.
Sentia J 